Authors: Laura Lee Guhrke
Guilty Series (90 page)
For Judy Guhrke.
You went the extra mile for me
in so many ways during
the writing of this book.
I love you, Mom.
L
ucia had always been a good liar. Whether this was a good thing or a bad thing depended on one's point of view. Lucia thought it a very good thing indeed when she was facing a palace guard at midnight, with tobacco and money in her pocket and plans of temporary escape in her head.
“I couldn't sleep, so I wanted something to read,” she said, and gestured to the book in her hand. A book, Lucia had learned long ago in her days at French finishing schools, was always a convenient explanation for nightly wanderings. And her father, Prince Cesare of Bolgheri, had one of the most extensive libraries in all of Europe. “I was on my way back to my rooms.”
“Your rooms are that way,” the guard explained, pointing in the opposite direction from where she'd been headed.
She glanced back over her shoulder, then returned her gaze to him. “They are?” she asked in pretended bewilderment. “I could have sworn they were the other way.” She gestured to the long corridor in which they stood, a corridor of Siena marble, gold leaf, glittering mirrors, and dozens of doorways. “It's so confusing here, I always get lost. So many corridors⦔ Lucia let her voice trail off in a helpless fashion, then she smiled. Lucia had a smile that could melt a man of stone; she knew it, and she used it whenever necessary.
This guard was not made of stone. He softened at once. “Very understandable,” he said, smiling back at her. “But you know we have orders from His Highness, Prince Cesare, that you are not allowed to wander about the palace at night.”
Her father was a stranger to her and the Piazza di Bolgheri was a prison, but she had no intention of being locked up in some remote corner and forgotten. She was a woman grown, with every intention of doing as she pleased. She did not express these sentiments aloud, however. “I didn't mean to wander,” she said, all meekness and contrition. “As I said, I couldn't sleep.”
“I will be happy to escort you back to your rooms.”
Not made of stone, but not stupid either. With a silent sigh of resignation, Lucia allowed herself
to be led back to her suite, knowing this was only a temporary postponement of her plans. Tonight was the last night of Carnival in Bolgheri, and guards or no guards, she was not going to miss the festivities.
Back in her suite of rooms, she found that her maid was still gone. The magic of Carnival beckoned to everyone, and she had dismissed Margherita so that the girl might enjoy it. Lucia passed through the darkened rooms to the doors that led onto the terrace. She waited until the guard on patrol had passed her and turned the corner, then she slipped outside and took a different route to her intended destination.
Moonlight and fireworks lit the sky. The sounds of music and revelry beckoned to her, celebrations that would last only a few more hours.
Though she had been living in her father's palace a few months, Lucia had learned her way around in less than a week. She had already determined which places were the easiest points from which to escape, and she headed straight for one of them.
The bawdy noise of Carnival grew louder as she approached the edge of the palace grounds, but she had barely pulled the gardener's ladder from the shrubs where she'd hidden it earlier in the day and set it against the stone wall of Cesare's fruit garden before her night of adventure was interrupted once again.
The hand on her arm made her jump, but when she turned around expecting to face another
palace guard, she instead found the last person she would have expected.
“Elena?” She stared at her half sister, amazed. “What are you doing out here?”
“I was looking out my window,” Elena answered, out of breath. “I saw you crossing the lawn in the moonlight, and I ran down to follow you.” The younger girl wrapped her night robe tighter around herself and glanced at the ladder, then looked back at her. “Are you running away?”
“Go back to bed.”
“Don't run away!” the seventeen-year-old implored, her hand tightening on Lucia's arm. “Things have been so much fun since you came. Oh, Lucia, I couldn't bear it if you left.”
“Don't be silly,” she said as she pulled her arm free of her half sister's grasp. “I'm not running away. Although I will, the moment I can get enough money to do it. Tonight, I am just going out for Carnival.”
“All by yourself?”
Lucia chuckled and opened her arms in a sweeping gesture. “Do you see anyone with me?”
“Papa would be furious if he found out.”
Lucia gave Elena a stern look. “He isn't going to find out unless you tell him.”
“I won't tell, I promise.” Elena glanced again at the ladder, then back at her. “You do this all the time, don't you?”
The concept of sneaking out was one Elena was clearly not familiar with, but Lucia had known that long before she'd ever met her half
sister. Elena was the good girl, the legitimate daughter, the true princess. Lucia was the wild one, Prince Cesare's bastard child and shameful secret. She was no princess, and nobody really expected her to be good. She wouldn't have traded places with Elena for anything.
“Go back to bed,” she ordered, and turned toward the wall. “For heaven's sake, you're standing out here in your night robe.”
“So are you.”
“I have clothes on underneath.”
“Are you wearing a costume?” Before Lucia could answer, Elena's hand closed around her arm again. “Take me with you.”
“What?” Lucia stopped and shook her head. “Oh, no. Cesare would kill me. For me to sneak out and get into trouble is nothing. I've done it before, and they expect no better of me. It's different for you. You can't come.”
“Oh, please. Antonio gets to go out and do whatever he pleases, but I only get to watch Carnival from the balcony. I want to wear a costume and go into the streets like everybody else does.”
“No, you don't. It would shock you. It's crude, it's noisy. You'd hate it. You'd be horrified.”
“I wouldn't. Please take me with you.” Elena stared at her in the moonlight, looking for all the world like an adorable puppy who had been cruelly denied a walk. “They never let me go anywhere,” she whispered, sounding so forlorn that Lucia's heart constricted with affection and pity.
Poor girl.
Her older brother, Antonio, was allowed all the liberties the son of a prince could ask for, but Elena was destined from cradle to grave for a life of royal imprisonment, sheltered and pampered and married off in a few years for the sake of alliance, never having known the richness of life outside palace gates and golden carriages.
“Come along, then,” she found herself saying before she could regain her common sense. “But stick close to me,” she added, gesturing for her sister to precede her up the ladder. “The last thing I need is for you to get lost.”
“You'll think I'm your shadow,” Elena promised, and paused at the top of the wall, straddling it. “How do I get down?”
“Just sit there for a minute.” Lucia moved the ladder over a few feet, climbed up, and hiked her skirts up above her knees to do as Elena had done. Then she hauled up the ladder and lowered it on the other side. After descending to the alley below, she beckoned to Elena to follow and stripped off her velvet night robe to reveal the peasant clothes she wore beneath.
“The first thing we have to do is get you a costume,” she said as she unraveled her long braid of dark hair to let it hang down her back. “And a mask,” she added, pulling a black-satin mask from her pocket and putting it across her eyes. She fastened the ties at the back of her head, wrapped a red kerchief around her hair, and started out of the alley. “Wait here.”
With some of the money she'd been hoarding, Lucia was able to procure a costume and mask similar to her own for Elena from one of the many street vendors who provided such last-minute necessities to those unprepared for Carnival. True to her word, Elena stayed on her heels as they slipped out of the alley and began winding their way through the raucous streets of Bolgheri.
Carnival was always an impressive spectacle. The balconies and windows were swathed in colorful draperies, the carriages and wagons were laden with harlequins, dominoes, and jesters, boisterous crowds roamed the streets, and music, fireworks, and confetti filled the air. Lucia and Elena spent a few hours watching the entertainments of mimes, acrobats, minstrels, and jugglers. Street vendors tried to tempt them into games of chance, but Lucia refused, smiling. She wasn't such a fool to risk her few precious coins on games she knew she couldn't win.
Elena did not say much, but as she stared in wonder at the sights all around them, the smile of delight on her face spoke volumes. Her joy at being free, even if only for a night, was obvious and heartfelt, and Lucia was so glad she'd brought the younger girl along. When Elena was back inside the prison of the palace, she would have a memory that would always make her smile.
As they paused to watch a performance of the
Commedia dell'Arte
in the center of a square, Lucia noticed a cart and oxen pull up beside them. In the back were two young men dressed as Nea
politan harvesters. The driver braked the cart as the pair waved and called to them to gain their attention.
“Look, Elena, we have a pair of admirers.”
Her half sister followed her glance, smiled shyly at the men, then looked away again. “How boldly they stare at us.”
“They are tall and strong,” Lucia said with approval. “A pity we cannot see their faces behind those masks to know if they are handsome. Ah, well.” Lucia smiled at the pair of men and blew them a flirtatious kiss.
The taller one gestured to her to pull off her mask and kerchief. Still smiling, she shook her head in refusal and watched him put a hand over his heart as if devastated. Laughing, she waved good-bye and turned to Elena. “Come. I want a coffee.”
Elena followed as Lucia merged into the midst of the crowded piazza, making her way toward the coffeehouses and bakeries on the opposite side. By the sheerest luck, they managed to gain a table at an outdoor café and ordered coffee. As they waited for it to be brought, Lucia pulled her tobacco and papers out of her pocket and began rolling a cigarette with the ease of long practice.
Elena stared at her in amazement. “You are going to smoke?”
“Don't look so horrified,” Lucia answered, amused. “At least it's not hashish. Want one?”
“Women aren't supposed to smoke.”
Lucia reached for the candle on their table.
“Exactly,” she said, and lit her cigarette, then leaned back in her chair, smiling at Elena's shocked face.
In coloring, they were not unlikeâboth of them had the dark eyes and dark, curly hair of their father, but that was where the similarity ended. Elena was delicate, sweet, and painfully idealistic, everything Lucia was not. Perhaps that was why she had grown so fond of the girl during the three months she'd lived here. Though Elena participated in all royal functions and Lucia was kept out of sight at the opposite end of the palace, the two had managed to meet. Lonely and isolated from others, they had become secret friends.
“I didn't want to like you, you know,” Lucia blurted out, blowing smoke into the air overhead.
“You didn't?”
“No. I came here fully prepared to hate you.”
To her surprise, Elena began to laugh. “I didn't want to like you either,” she confessed. “When we met, and you told me that you were Papa's bastard, I hated you. I didn't know he had any other daughter but me.”
Lucia made a sound of derision. “That's no surprise. No one knows about me.”
“I meant what I said before. I have had so much fun since you came. Hearing your stories, knowing all the outrageous things you've done, things I would never dare to doâ”
“Listening to other people talk about life is no good, Elena,” she interrupted. “Life is rich and
sweet and very short. One has to live it, not watch it from a palace balcony.”
Elena frowned, looking doubtful. But then she reached out her hand toward the cigarette. “Let me try this.”
“If you've never smoked before, you won't like it,” she said as she complied with the girl's request. “Just inhale a little bit,” she added in warning, but it was too late.
In a fit of coughing, Elena waved away smoke and handed back the cigarette as quickly as possible. “That,” she said with a shudder, “is one experience I am content to avoid. It's horrid!”
“It is rather,” Lucia agreed.
“Why do you do it?”
“Because I'm not allowed to, I suppose.”
“What else have you done that you're not allowed to do?”
“Nearly everything,” she admitted, not sure if she should be proud of that fact or not.
“Doesn't your mother mind?”
“Mamma?” Lucia smiled, remembering Francesca's visits to her in boarding school, thinking of the dithery charm her mother possessed that captivated everyone. Lucia herself was not immune. She adored her mother. “It's hard to tell what Mamma really thinks about anything.”
“Tell me more of the things you've done.” Without waiting for an answer, she went on, “Have you ever kissed a man?”
“Of course.”
Elena's eyes widened with all the eager curiosity
of any seventeen-year-old girl with no experience. “What was it like?”
Lucia told her the truth. “Wonderful. I can't explain why, but it is.”
“Who did you kiss?” Elena asked. “Who was he?”
Lucia's mind flashed back to a summer three years before, and she was surprised to discover it no longer hurt to think of it. “His name was Armand. He was the blacksmith in the village by Madame Tournay's Academy. I was madly in love with him.”
“A blacksmith? How did you meet him?”
“One day, I was in the village on an errand, and I saw him. He was standing over his anvil, pounding away. He had no shirt on, and sweat was running down his chest. I just stopped and stared at him. I'd never seen a man's bare chest before. He looked up and caught me staring. He smiled at me, and I fell in love with him. It was as simple as that. I started sneaking out at night to meet him. Armand made me feel beautiful and desirable for the first time in my life. It was the most glorious, wonderful thing that had ever happened to me.”